


Out Of The Blue, Into The Black

by fourfreedoms, joyfulseeker



Category: Hockey RPF
Genre: Accidental Voyeurism, Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Fraternity, Internalized Homophobia, M/M, Making Out, Obliviousness, accidentally turned on, handjobs
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-05-29
Updated: 2017-06-04
Packaged: 2018-11-06 07:20:20
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 8,691
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11031345
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fourfreedoms/pseuds/fourfreedoms, https://archiveofourown.org/users/joyfulseeker/pseuds/joyfulseeker
Summary: “I gotta level with you,” Patrick says, tossing down his grease-stained napkin. “You’re depressing the fuck out of me, here. Please, man. Do what you need to do. Find a nice young woman and do depraved things with her.” He says with a laugh. “Quit moping.”That gets Jonny’s attention, but he just rolls his eyes.After months of watching Jonny mope around after his girlfriend breaks up with him, Patrick has had enough.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> joyfulseeker and I started this a million years ago. So long ago that we had some joking references to Trump's presidential candidacy in here that we had to change, because A) ouch pain, and B) well, welcome to 2017. We finally decided to start posting it here to release it into the world to force ourselves to finish it. 
> 
> We'll update the tags as we add additional chapters. Try not to kill fourfreedoms for having two wips going at once, y'all.

Patrick gets it. Breaking up with your girlfriend sucks. However, Jonny’s been taking it to the next level for nearly a month now. He was in a horrible mood all throughout spring break, he barely left their hotel in Miami Beach. The guys walked on tiptoes around him the entire trip, and since then he’s been snappish and grouchy with all the poor pledges who just want to worship the ground he walks upon. Jonny has a right to be a little stressed. They’re closing in on end of the year finals, and he’s double majoring in econ and cog sci like the insane person he is. He’s been interviewing for all of these hardcore internships, unlike Patrick who’s already got a gig lined up with FiveThirtyEight. But historically, there have definitely been worse times for him stress-wise. With the Wildcats’ season over, it’s not like he’s juggling soccer practice and games on top of everything else. Basically he’s wearing out Patrick’s patience. He just wants his bro back, not this automaton who just works out and does school work and can’t even be convinced to go out for a beer or a little pickup game of basketball. 

Jonny’s always been intense, but he’s also always been willing to let loose too. Sharpy passed on the presidency of Chi Beta to him for a reason. And well, pledges worship him. Watching Jonny mope around is a serious boner killer, he doesn’t even get what the big deal is. Carolyn was cool and all, beautiful, stacked, but it’s not like she and Jonny were going to get married or anything. It took them nearly three months of hooking up to even call it a relationship, which had been hilarious to Patrick at the time, because Jonny hadn’t been banging anybody else, but had clearly not wanted to commit. But whatever, he obviously misses her now. He’s being a giant pain the ass after all. 

They’ve got to figure out what’s up with him though, because Patrick does not want the last semester of his junior year marred with Jonny being a pussy bitch. 

“Do you think getting laid would help?” Patrick asks, sucking hard on lollypop, as he schools Seabs and Duncs on CoD. 

Seabs doesn’t look away from the screen as he makes a considering noise. He better not look away at the rate that Patrick’s kill count is rising, he thinks gleefully. 

“Wouldn’t hurt, right?” Seabs ventures. “He hasn’t brought anybody back here in a long time.” 

Patrick is well aware. They share a wall. The same wall that Jonny’s headboard is against. And unless he’s been picking up in the library and going for it in the stacks (massively unlike Jonathan Toews), Jonny’s been a stone cold monk for two months. Which, now that Patrick thinks about it, does sound like the problem. If you let that shit get backed up, god only knows what could go wrong. 

“What’re you thinking to do about it? Set up a fund for a classy escort?” Duncs asks. 

Seabs dies on the screen and throws his controller aside. “Jesus. Why do I even bother?” 

Patrick pulls the sucker out of his mouth. “Too thirsty for getting owned?” he says with a cackling laugh as Seabs flicks him off. 

*

Patrick is obviously not setting up a fund for an escort, classy or otherwise. There are better uses for that money—beer, weed, pizza, fixing the broken door out to the backyard which Duncs claimed he was going to do forever ago. But he figures it doesn’t hurt to say something to Jonny, maybe subtly suggest he needs to get his dick wet before he explodes. 

Only problem, Patrick realizes, with being subtle is that it sounds kind of weird and gay to be asking Jonny so offhand if he’s getting enough. He comes to this conclusion in Henry Crown doing a set of bench presses while Jonny is spotting him. Occupied as he is, he can’t quite come up with a way to say it that won’t be embarrassing for them both. 

Jonny knows him too well though, because somewhere around the twelfth rep he snorts and Patrick and says, “Out with it.” 

“What?” Patrick asks innocently. 

“You’ve got something on your mind,” Jonny replies. “So, out with it.” 

Patrick huffs. Jonny added two extra twenty pound weights to the bar today, because he’s being a dick right now and claims that Patrick is being lazy and isn’t living up to his full potential. Patrick fights through the first set of reps, gritting his teeth. 

“I don’t know, man,” he says, wanting to pull his own teeth out more than he wants to have this conversation. “You’ve been in a really bad mood.” 

Jonny just counts for him rather than answering. “Eight, nine, keep it up, Peeks.” 

“I’m just wondering—” he pauses to get the bar to the top of the lift, “—like I’m just wondering if maybe you need to uh...blow off some steam.” 

“How do you mean?” Jonny asks, voice neutral. Patrick can’t really see his face from this angle, so he’s got no idea what he’s thinking. 

“Pick up, take somebody—” he has to cut himself off again, arms really starting to burn, “—back to the house. Relieve a little, ah, pressure.” 

Jonny snorts, but he doesn’t seem to be actively annoyed. 

“Don’t try to lie to me, man, I know it’s been a while,” Patrick replies. Fuck, each lift is coming slower and slower as Patrick struggles to maintain the proper form in his arms and also not to just drop the bar down over his chest. 

“Seventeen, eighteen, just two more, Peeks, you can do it,” Jonny says. Patrick valiantly powers through the last two, huffing and puffing the entire time. When he gets to the top of the press Jonny takes the bar and lifts it back into the cradle. Jonny knocks his shoulder and says, “Good job.” 

Patrick sits upright, arms like jello. Jonny removes the clips on the bar and pulls off some of the weights, substituting them for some heavier ones. 

“Show off,” he mutters. 

“Up,” Jonny says, kicking at his foot. Patrick gets up so that Jonny can take his place. When Patrick’s back behind him at the head of the bench, Jonny wraps his hands around the bar, flexing his fingers for a moment before lifting it out of the cradle. 275 pounds, Patrick thinks, he really is a show off. But then Jonny breathes out and starts lifting the bar at a much smoother, quicker rate than Patrick managed. 

After about ten of them, he says, “It’s fine, Kaner, don’t worry about it.” 

Patrick assumes he means letting off steam and not the bar, because as far as Patrick can tell he’s got it pretty well covered. He holds back a sigh. 

When Jonny finishes, Patrick says, “Bet I can outlast you on the bikes.” 

Jonny’s eyes flash. “You’re on.” 

So. That went well. 

*

Over lunch a couple days later, Patrick tries again. Jonny’s spent most of the meal just staring off into space over Patrick’s right shoulder, in between occasional mouthfuls of chicken soup. Patrick looked behind himself twice out of reflex before he realized there wasn’t anyone there. Trying to hold a conversation with him right now is a recipe in frustration. Patrick takes a whole ten minutes describing the injustice of losing a letter-grade on a problem set just because he forgot a minus-sign in the final answer, and Jonny, after a long pause, just says, “Yeah, that sucks.” 

“I gotta level with you,” Patrick says, tossing down his grease-stained napkin. “You’re depressing the fuck out of me, here. Please, man. Do what you need to do. Find a nice young woman and do depraved things with her.” He says with a laugh. “Quit moping.”

That gets Jonny’s attention, but he just rolls his eyes. “Thanks for the life advice,” he says and spoons up the rest of his soup, which is the lunch of sadness as far as Patrick is concerned. Even if Jonny follows it up with the other two plates of food on his tray. 

That’s the problem, really. Jonny’s irritability is kind of like the weather. If need be, Patrick can live with it. But Jonny seems persistently down, and that is harder to take.

“Let’s go out tonight,” Patrick says. It’s Friday night, and the house two doors down has been flyering all the hallways.

“I dunno,” Jonny says. “Maybe.” 

“Dude, not maybe,” Patrick says. “Yes, absolutely.”

Jonny stands up and dumps his empty tray. “Maybe,” he says firmly.

Oh, so it’s going to be like that. Patrick cocks his eyebrow at Jonny and follows him. 

*

Jonny’s in his room, listening to whiny folk music and folding laundry when Patrick goes to get him that night. He stares at him in horror. Oh god, Jonny has sunk so far. 

“What?” Jonny says, holding up a pair of socks he’s rolled together. “Did you need something?”

_Out of the blue and into the black/You pay for this/but they give you that/And once you're gone, you can't come back/When you're out of the blue/and into the black._

“No, no, no,” Patrick says. “It’s Friday night and you’re in here listening to sad warbling? No, man, I’m sorry. I wouldn’t be a good friend to you if I let this continue.” 

“This is Neil Young, asshole,” Jonny says. “And there’s nothing wrong with taking a night off.”

“Dude, this isn't taking a night off, this is a cry for help,” Patrick says. 

Jonny picks up a t-shirt and shakes it out with a brisk snap of his wrists, then starts aligning the seams. “Just not feeling it,” he says dismissively. “But have a good time.”

Patrick stands there for a moment trying not to lose his temper. 

“So,” Patrick says slowly. “I didn’t want to do this, man, but you forced my hand. You must just want me to post those pictures from that one rush party on your Facebook timeline really badly. You remember, right? From back before you got lame.”

Jonny lowers the shirt and stares at Patrick, who raises his eyebrows. They're terrible photos, Jonny passed out and half-naked, and Patrick had drawn all over him—boobs over his pecs, 'Thirsty for PKane' across his forehead, a dick on his cheek. Patrick wasn't exactly Van Gogh here, but Jonny was mortified by them regardless. Oh well, he brought them to this place, he’d have to live with the consequences.

“Fucking hell,” Jonny says, disgusted. He tosses the shirt back on his pile of laundry and shoves Patrick in the stomach. “Get out of my room. Guess I have to get changed.”

Patrick laughs, triumphant. “Five minutes,” he says.

“Blackmailer,” Jonny yells back. 

*

Jonny isn’t a total stick in the mud at the Rho Alpha Phi party at least. His cell stays firmly in his pocket and he’s socializing with a couple of guys from his team, both freshman. But he’s staying well away from where the dancing and the games of flip-cup and pong are, which of course, is where everybody female is hanging. Patrick doesn’t know what his damage is. Before Carolyn it was what he did—score fast and often just like Patrick. Now he’s hanging out with the kiddies and barely even nodding at the chicks who say hello to him as they pass. Maybe Jonny’s dick is broken. 

Well if the mountain won’t come to Muhammad, Muhammad will have to go to the mountain. 

He and Jonny have known each other since they were kids, back before Patrick got injured and Jonny gave up hockey for soccer, but they’ve been friends since they were grouped in the same suite as freshman. They rushed the same frat in the spring and they’ve been tight ever since. All of which is to say that Patrick has ample experience of what Jonny goes for in a girl: blonde and big tits with a good sense of humor. Patrick doesn’t have time to go around demanding the ladies around here tell him some warm up jokes, but he’s sure he can find someone who covers the other two categories. 

He strikes gold in the front hall on the way to the kitchen. There’s a girl in a tiny blue dress, solo cup in hand, hanging with a group of friends. She’s a blonde so pale it’s almost platinum and she’s got an anime body spilling out of that dress. When she talks, he detects an accent. Even better, a hot euro chick. 

When he gets back to Jonny he sees the sad sack get his phone out, fiddling on the screen rather than talking to anybody. Unless Jonny is texting some booty call right now, this cannot stand. 

“You need another drink,” Patrick states and tugs on Jonny’s elbow. 

“Kaner, it’s cool,” Jonny protests as Patrick bodily hauls him towards the kitchen. They have to pass through that same hallway as the girl in the blue dress and when they get close, Patrick deliberately stumbles, pushing Jonny into her.

“What the—” Jonny cries, hands snapping out to grab her shoulders so that he doesn’t knock her right over. 

She looks up at him startled, cup clenched tight in her hand, the other one on his chest. “It’s good I’d finished my drink,” she says after a moment in that same sexy accent. 

“Yeah, jesus,” Jonny says, he looks over at Patrick above her head with a glare, “Sorry, my buddy is a sloppy fucking drunk.” 

Patrick shouts, “Sorryyyyy!” too loud, not having to pretend all that hard to be wasted. She huffs and turns back to Jonny who has to quickly school his face back into a calm expression. Patrick flashes him a cheeky thumbs up before high-tailing it to the kitchen. 

He keeps an eye out in between getting drafted into a game of flip-cup, and things seem to be going pretty well. At least, Jonny hasn’t drifted back to the corner, and he’s still talking to that girl when Patrick squeezes past them in search of a bathroom. In typical fashion, someone’s taking up the downstairs toilet and yells “Fuck off!” when Patrick hammers on the door after a minutes of increasingly-urgent waiting. 

“Fuck yourself!” Patrick hollers back, and heads upstairs. There has to be another bathroom in this joint. It involves opening a couple firmly closed doors, but he eventually finds one, an en suite in someone’s master bedroom. Whatever, though, those doors weren’t locked, and this is an emergency. It’s quiet in here, away from the noise of the party, and Patrick thinks there are possibly very few things that feel as good as pissing when you’re drunk. Like obviously getting laid when you’re drunk is better, and maybe bacon breakfast sandwiches. If it was the end all be all, he would’ve gotten Jonny drunk and made him drink a ton of water ages ago. 

He wonders how it’s going though. Jonny _had_ looked engrossed when he’d passed them, leaning in close to hear her over the noise of the music and smiling. If he plays his cards right, he’s pretty sure Jonny can get in there. 

He’s just washing his hands when the door to the bedroom thuds open, letting in all the noise from downstairs. Either another person has an urgent need for the facilities like Patrick or they’re here to make use of the bed. 

Patrick opens his mouth to call out to them that he’ll be out in just a minute, when he’s interrupted by a high-pitched feminine giggle followed by a groan. 

Well somebody is definitely feeling an urgent need for something. He bumps at the door with his hip as he’s drying his hands, intending to mock whoever it is a little and then go on his way when he realizes that’s Jonny sitting on the edge of the bed with a topless girl in his lap. 

Oh fuck. Patrick immediately backs away from the door. There’s only a slight gap. He doesn’t think they saw him. The last thing, the very last thing, he wants to do is interrupt Jonny when he’s getting his groove on, especially after all his hard work. Jonny needs this, and Patrick just knows busting out of the bathroom now will end it pretty quick. 

But also he has no desire to hang out in the bathroom, an unsought audience to _whatever_ is happening out there. His eyes dart around the bathroom, trapped, thinking hard. Maybe he can sneak out without them seeing. They might notice a sudden shaft of added light in the room though. He feels a little ridiculous even contemplating it, but if he switches it off he can probably slowly crawl out on his hands and knees without getting noticed. He hopes Jonny knows how much love Patrick has for him, because there is literally no one else that he would even consider this nonsense for. 

He switches the light off and holds his breath, as far as he can tell nobody has jumped up in surprise, so he tries peeking back around the crack in the door to see if the coast is clear. Well, they’ve graduated to the clothes-off portion of the night anyway. But Patrick doesn’t think he’s going to be able to open the door without attracting a lot of attention. They’re a little busy and all right now, sucking face, but he’s directly to Jonny’s left. No way he doesn’t notice a door opening up only five feet away. 

Patrick moves away from the door again with a sigh. Welp. He’s got his phone with him. He can play Ninja Pizza Girl for a little while. It’s not like the party is that hoppin’ anyway. Things are mostly quiet, so it’s not even that awkward knowing that Jonny is getting it on on the other side of the door. He’s a little used to this after all—Jonny and Carolyn used to have sex in the evening like clockwork while Patrick was in his room doing his calc homework. Jonny was at least a small modicum of considerate and put music on, but it was hard to cover up the sound of the loose headboard slamming into the wall. 

There’s some whispered conversation in the bedroom that Patrick tunes out, but it sounds pretty tame. He hopes Jonny’s not out there just holding hands with this girl. He doesn’t think so—naked handholding is a weird thing to do, but there is a definite lack of sex noises. 

Well, that doesn’t last long. It turns out euro girl is very loud, so loud she’s practically shouting. Is Jonny murdering her in there? What the hell! He peeks around the door before he can think better of it and freezes, stunned. 

The girl’s on top of Jonny, but sprawled flat on his chest while they make out, she’s not so much riding Jonny as using him as a dildo, flexing her hips, back dipping and bowing, working his dick only the barest few inches back and forth inside her. It’s clearly working for her, if those loudass cries are anything to go by. And Jonny’s just laying there, arms around her, letting her do it. She’s so preoccupied that she’s more moaning against Jonny’s mouth than kissing him. But Jonny must not mind, because the corner of his lips have turned up in the beginning of a smile. Patrick’s never seen anything like it. It’s—well, it’s hot. 

Patrick, remembering himself, jerks himself away from the door. His cheeks have gone hot and he feels an uncomfortable swooping sensation in his belly. Shit. He shouldn’t be perving on them while they’re doing their thing. That’s not buddies. And also, omg, how fucked up is it that he finds anything Jonny does hot. That’s just not right. But his brain keeps replaying it over and over, the way he had looked, cheeks flushed, hair sticking damply to his forehead, cock all shiny on the condom from her wet, holding himself so still for her. 

Patrick swallows, mouth suddenly dry. He glances around the edge of the door again but everything’s the same, no chance of escape. Jonny’s still flat on the bed as she brings herself off, his only movement his hands sliding down her back, fingers stroking lightly against her skin. When Patrick turns away from the door to sit with his back against the wall, that’s the image he can’t shake, seeing it behind his eyes when he squeezes them shut and shoves his palm down against his hardening cock, trying to get relief. He can’t even bang his head against the wall like he wants when the sounds in the other room increase in frequency. Patrick’s going to take this experience to the grave, which is too bad, since Jonny’s never going to know how much of Patrick’s personal dignity he’s sacrificing for the sake of Jonny’s health and happiness.

When the room goes quiet, Patrick peeks again, only to find that they’ve switched it up, and the girl is bent over Jonny’s waist, giving him the filthiest blowjob he’s ever seen. She’s on her knees on the mattress near his left hip, still moaning occasionally as she works her lips over the head of his dick. Jonny has his arm crooked around the back of her thigh. His forearm is shifting rhythmically as he fingers her. It’s a display of coordination that Patrick can’t fathom considering how close he seems to coming, the desperate tension in his face, eyes tightly closed and mouth dropped open. Patrick bites his lip and pulls back, reaching out with his fingertips to push the door closed so not even a strip of the bedroom is visible. 

It takes a long time before Patrick hears anything else from the other room, and then it’s just a murmur of voices. He hears Jonny say something about the sheets, and then low laughter on either side. Footsteps that almost give him a heart attack when he thinks they’re heading toward the bathroom before the door to the hallway opens and closes again. He blows out a long breath and pulls the door open, first a little bit and then the rest of the way when he sees the bedroom is empty. 

At least, Patrick thinks, Jonny’ll have gotten out of his stupid funk. He presses his hand to his dick again. Jesus, no one with a night like that could possibly be feeling any pain.

*

Patrick wakes up with a beast of hangover and trudges down to breakfast swearing to himself that he’ll never drink tequila again. Seabs is in the kitchen frying up eggs and bacon and he takes pity on Patrick and makes him up a plate. There’s coffee already in the pot too. 

“Thank god,” Patrick groans when he gets his first sip. “Marry me, man. I’ll consent to do the cleaning.” 

Seabs snorts and waves the spatula at him. “I’m an independant lady, Kaner, I’ll do my own cleaning.” 

Jonny, when he makes it down the stairs, unfairly looks healthy and glowing, like he got a full eight hours of rest. Images from last night swim through Patrick's brain and he pushes them away. No way is he up for dealing with them in harsh daylight with a hangover gnawing at him. Jonny's never great in the morning, so Patrick doesn’t try to talk to him until he’s had his disgusting yogurt and muesli and his own cup of coffee. He reads the paper in the morning, an actual print copy, and hates to be interrupted. 

“Did you get that girl’s number?” Patrick asks when Jonny has cleaned his bowl and set the weekend edition aside. 

Jonny grunts rather than answers, so Patrick takes that as a no. Well, that’s fine, he lightened the load so to speak, last night, that’s something. Patrick isn’t going to expect miracles.

He’s checking the sports highlights on his phone when Jonny says sharply, “Hey! Mind waiting until we clear out of the kitchen before you start that thing?” He looks up, and that quiet underclassman, Turbo, is guiltily pulling his finger away from the start button on the blender. What? Like Jonny wasn’t blending smoothies until 10 PM all last week? While Patrick watches, Turbo starts unplugging the blender, like he’s going to lug it away to another room to use it.

It’s such a blatant display of bad temper that it takes Patrick a second to snap out of his surprise before he says, “Yo, Turbo, don’t worry about it. We’re done already.” That blender isn’t going to do his hangover any favors, but it’s not like Turbo doesn’t have the right to make breakfast. 

Jonny presses his lips together and dumps his cereal bowl in the sink before clearing the room. Turbo, poor kid, is still looking dismayed at the counter.

Patrick is also a little dismayed. Jonny so rarely takes his irritation out on others. It’s part of the reason everybody is so chill with him. If he gets mad it usually turns inward, but now it’s been a month of sharp comments and slamming doors. Patrick wonders if he’s depressed or something. How could he not be in a good mood after last night? Patrick had backstage passes to it, he’s pretty positive Jonny enjoyed himself. 

This is too much. Patrick’s aching head cannot handle this shit.


	2. Chapter 2

He ends up going back to sleep and crashing most of the day, only waking up when somebody starts blasting Wu-Tang Clan downstairs. When he looks at the clock it’s nearly 3 PM. Fuck. Lost nearly the whole day and his head still hurts. He throws himself into the shower, hanging out under the spray until it finally stops feeling like somebody’s b-boying on his brain. He needs some painkillers and another gallon of water and then he’ll maybe even be able to feel like normal again. 

When he looks for the aspirin he finds that the little plastic bottle is empty, but he knows Jonny must have some. They share a bathroom connected between their two bedrooms, but a cursory check of the medicine cabinet on his side reveals nothing. Patrick goes back to his room to throw some sweatpants on, before knocking on his door. He’d rather not face Jonny’s continuing wrath with just the meager defenses of a towel. 

Jonny just calls out a “Yeah?” when Patrick thumps on the door 

“Yo, do you have painkillers?” Patrick calls back. “I’m out, and I still feel like death from last night.” 

“Yeah, come in,” Jonny replies. Patrick opens the door and finds him at his desk doing what looks like homework. 

“It’s Saturday,” Patrick protests. 

“No, really?” Jonny says, not looking up from his books. “Advil’s in my nightstand.” 

Patrick sighs, pulling open the top drawer in his nightstand and rooting through all the junk Jonny’s storing in there before he finds the bottle. He grabs it up and turns back around to thank Jonny and he finds him still hunched over, pencil scratching away. Patrick’s suffused with a sudden wash of anger. He doesn’t understand what’s going on. 

“Man, what’s with you?” he asks, before his brain can remind his mouth that this is a terrible idea. 

Jonny shrugs nonchalantly without ever once meeting Patrick’s eyes. “Really don’t know what you’re talking about.” 

“Listen, I’m sorry if Carolyn was the love of your life or whatever, but—”

“Who the fuck says Carolyn was the love of my life?” Jonny snaps, finally looking back at Patrick. 

Patrick throws up his hands. “You’ve been acting like a pissy bitch ever since you broke up with her.” 

“Why won’t you just leave it?” Jonny asks, tossing his pen down onto the desk.

“Me? What the hell am _I_ doing?” Patrick replies. “I’m just trying to hang and you’re acting like somebody shit in your sundae.” 

“Maybe I’m fucking annoyed because you won’t leave me alone!” Jonny replies, getting to his feet. “Did that ever occur to you, whiz kid?” 

“Yeah, this is all my fault,” Patrick scoffs. 

“I didn’t say it was, but quit hanging on my nuts, jesus!” Jonny shouts in Patrick’s face. He’s furious, red-faced and eyes bright. It looks so strangely similar to what Patrick remembers from last night, that same flushed knitted-brow expression when that chick was blowing him that he’s taken aback. He’s seen Jonny angry plenty of times, so he doesn’t know why his belly feels all strange right now. 

“I don’t need to get laid, I don’t need to get set up. Just leave it the fuck alone,” Jonny’s still shouting, but Patrick barely hears him, eyes focusing on the curve of his mouth rather than the content. 

If you asked him later what he thought he was doing when he kissed Jonny, he wouldn’t have been able to give you an answer, but right now, it seems like a really good idea. 

“What the—Kaner!” Jonny says as Patrick pushes in close. It's almost like his brain stutters for a moment, a crucial second where thought and action merge together. Patrick hooks his hand over Jonny's shoulder, pulls him down and kisses him.

Jonny gasps against his mouth, but he doesn’t push him away, instead he drags Patrick in tight, hand coming up to cup the back of his head. The tension in Patrick's stomach flares into heat, his heart rate accelerating. He drops the Advil bottle, freeing up his hand to push Jonny back up against his desk, as it rattles across the floor, pills scattering. His fingers are biting into the fabric of the front of Jonny's t-shirt and it's crazy, Jonny just goes with it, head angled down so they can keep kissing. His body is solid and warm where Patrick's shoved up against him. Jonny’s other hand comes up to cradle the side of Patrick's face and Jonny opens his mouth, kiss accelerating into a dirty slide of tongue against tongue as Patrick moves in even closer, until Jonny reaches back blindly and shoves his stack of books and papers away from the edge of his desk and sits back, legs spreading, and pulls Patrick in with him.

The knock on Jonny's door takes them both by surprise. Patrick jolts back, fist still twisted in Jonny's shirt, as Jonny drops his hands.

“What?” Jonny calls, voice thrumming under Patrick's fingertips, and Patrick belatedly lets go and backs up. He’s hot and cold at the same time, turned on and out of breath. He feels like he just got mugged by making out. Patrick drags the heel of his hand over his mouth on autopilot.

Jonny's flushed, like he was when he was yelling at Patrick, and he's staring at him, eyes wide with shock. He doesn't look mad anymore, but aside from the surprise, Patrick can't read a single thing on his face. Well, that makes two of them. He swallows, then turns and opens the door, shoving his way past Seabs and Crow. When he gets back to his room and sits down slowly on his bed, his renewed headache pulses behind his eyes. Jonny's Advil is now strewn all over the floor. Patrick's sure as shit not going back for it. 

*

Patrick wakes up the next morning from fitful dreams about having a disagreement with Jonny and not being able to make him understand what he’s saying. Patrick wouldn’t call himself an anxious person, but his anxiety dreams are many and varied: dreaming he’s back in high school after graduation, finding out he had class assignments he didn’t know about, forgetting to wear his pants, playing tag with his cousins and somehow never being able to run fast enough, being able to fly and then going to show it to somebody and suddenly not knowing how. He’s never been nervous about Jonny before though. Although Jonny has never acted like a giant erratic freakazoid before and Patrick’s never tried to kiss him. Obviously he’s thinking about him too much. 

He resolves to put that shit to an end, and not just because Jonny bawled him out. It’s exhausting. If Jonny’s going to be a giant stick in the mud, that’s his deal. Patrick’s done trying to fix this shit for him. It’s getting all weird and mixed up in his head. 

It’s strange though. When he makes it down to breakfast, fully expecting Tornado Toews to blow the kitchen apart, all his plans to put it behind him are thrown in disarray when he finds that Jonny’s actually in a decent mood, less fractious and more even-keeled than Patrick’s seen him in weeks. When he meets Patrick’s eyes, color floods his cheeks, and then Patrick’s blushing too. Jonny pulls his bowl of bananas and granola closer to his chest, practically burying his face in it. Patrick takes a long swallow of water and urgently looks elsewhere. Hopefully nobody notices how goddamn twitchy they are. 

They both act very carefully normal for the rest of the day. It’s awkward and tiring, and Patrick doesn’t know how to feel. Jonny doesn’t seem like he minds that it happened and Patrick’s left wondering what that means. It was—well, Jonny can kiss, he’ll give him that.

“You okay, space case?” Jonny asks after he totally airmails the toss during a game of three flies up in the back yard. 

Patrick stares back at him for a long moment, before shaking his head. “Yeah, yeah, fine.” 

Jonny laughs and claps him on the back. 

They go to the Kappa Delta barbecue a few houses down that night. Jonny for once doesn’t have to be harassed out of the house. When Seabs mentions as much, Patrick shrugs and changes the subject. Apparently Jonny liked making out with him. More than he liked carnal knowledge with a DD+ bombshell. Patrick watches Jonny gesture expansively with his hands in the middle of a story with some guys out on the patio. He’s enthusiastically talking and smiling, eyes sparkling, and looking at him—he doesn’t just feel like the same old Jonny anymore. 

The knowledge speeds his pulse up, hands shaking a little on his beer bottle. He hangs back from the rest of the barbecue, chilling in the kitchen with a few people under the pretense that he’s avoiding mosquitos. 

He's gotten stuck listening to a drunk rant about some Kappa Delta brother’s stats TA when Jonny comes into the kitchen to get a refill on his beer.

“Sucks, dude,” Patrick says, clapping his hand on the guy’s shoulder, then gives him a little shove toward the living room. “I think I hear someone looking for you, though.”

After the guy leaves, Jonny wanders over and leans against the counter on Patrick’s left. He shakes his head, mouth curving up. “Sneaky, man.”

“You didn't hear him,” Patrick protests. “That was fifteen minutes of my life I'll never get back.”

“Glad you're so patient,” Jonny says.

“Yeah, me too,” Patrick says. He runs his thumb along the label of his beer bottle and starts picking at the paper around the neck. “I swear. People hear about the internship and it's like, they either want to know who's going to win the world series or they start complaining about confidence intervals and the t-test.”

“It's a hard life,” Jonny says, straight-faced. 

Patrick takes a drink and salutes Jonny with the bottle. “Yeah, I know. I’m basically a saint.” He takes another drink, aware of how close they're standing. That unsteady feeling from the beginning of the night returns, a strange anticipation and nerves distilled together. Jonny’s attention feels warm against his skin. The rest of the room has emptied, leaving them alone in the kitchen. He turns his head to look at Jonny and a bare second later has to look back down at his drink.

“So, who is going to win the world series?” Jonny asks, and the question is so far from Patrick’s thoughts that it takes him entirely by surprise. He bursts out laughing.

He’s still smiling when Jonny clears his throat and reaches out and takes the beer bottle straight out of Patrick’s hands, fingertips sliding across Patrick’s knuckles. His attention narrows down to that sliver of contact. Jonny sets the bottle on the counter and then leans in so slowly Patrick has a long, stomach-flipping moment to realize that Jonny’s going to kiss him before he does. There’s a party going on right outside the door, but Jonny doesn’t seem to notice as he brushes their mouths together, and Patrick follows him instantly, rolling onto the balls of his feet. Jonny tilts his head, lips gliding smoothly over Patrick’s. Patrick’s heart beats fast in his chest, and he gasps raggedly when Jonny’s thumb drags down the curve of his jaw.

A shriek of laughter sounds outside, the noise of the party bursting in on them too-close nearby. Patrick startles, jumping away from Jonny, the sudden shock of fear swamping him. Anybody could walk in and see them, and they’re friends. Jonny’s his best friend at college, easy. He’s not looking to fuck that up. He doesn’t even know how to categorize or explain his own feelings about sitting in that bathroom with his back against the wall, listening, but the last thing he wants to do is get branded as some gay dude if they get caught making out. 

Jonny’s hand hovers in the air, frozen for a long moment, before he drops it limply to his side and shakes his head. “Sorry, I—” 

Patrick turns away from him. “I’m going to get another burger.” 

When he looks back at Jonny, his face is blank. “Okay,” he says, and then walks out of the kitchen. Patrick winces. 

He does get himself a burger and dicks around for a little bit, plays a game of ultimate in the backyard with their sick light-up frisbee. Somebody sends the frisbee over the back fence though and that pauses the game while they head next door to retrieve it. When he looks back over at the house he sees Jonny standing in one of the windows, that tiny little blonde from a few nights ago leaning on his chest. 

He watches Jonny smile down at her and has to turn away. 

“I’m out, guys,” Patrick says. 

Everybody says their goodbyes and Patrick leaves through the backyard, heading back to the Chi-Beta house. 

A couple guys are playing video games in the basement when Patrick gets back, but otherwise the house is quiet. It's not even 9:30, but Patrick goes straight upstairs to his room without stopping anywhere. Behind closed doors, he sags back on his bed, trying to quash the weight in his stomach that feels like disappointment. He's guessing Jonny won't be home tonight. Or, at least, Patrick wouldn't be if he were in his shoes.

It's barely twenty minutes later that he hears Jonny's tread in the bathroom. The taps turn on in the rhythm Patrick recognizes as Jonny's nightly routine. So he didn't go home with that girl after all. He can't have stayed at the party much longer than Patrick. Patrick stares up at his dark ceiling, lying flat on his back, held down by self-disgust. What the hell is wrong with him? Why should he care that Jonny came home early and alone? He rolls onto his side away from the door and shoves his face into the pillow, but he's awake when Jonny leaves the bathroom and goes to bed, and he's still awake an hour later when the rest of the guys trickle home from the barbecue.

The next morning Patrick wakes up late and lies in bed for a while, reluctant to face the day. He doesn't have class until the afternoon, but his bladder eventually forces him upright, and then once he's up and showered, he's got to get breakfast, so that sends him down to the kitchen. He’s mentally prepared to give Jonny a casual hello when he sees him, which turns out to be totally unnecessary since Jonny’s not even in the room. He keeps his head down while he gets cereal and coffee, not ready to get drawn into any conversation. By the end of breakfast, he’s worked his way back to humanity. When Jonny breezes in dressed in his running shorts and shoes, Patrick’s chest tightens for a second before releasing. 

He licks his lips nervously, then says, “You running outside, or heading to the gym?” Since Jonny also doesn't have morning classes on Mondays they usually work out together if they’re not slammed with homework.

Jonny glances at him. “I was thinking I’d head to the lake,” he says, but doesn’t meet Patrick’s eyes. 

“Sweet, just give me a second to get dressed,” Patrick says, too brightly.

“Hurry up,” Jonny calls after him. 

“Keep your pants on, Toews,” Patrick shouts down the stairs, and then scrambles into his own workout gear in his room.

Jonny sets a fast pace at first, and Patrick struggles to keep up. “You’re a dick,” he pants, punching Jonny lightly in the side. 

Jonny huffs a laugh, dodging away. “Too slow,” he says breathlessly, but slows down to their usual speed.

They run on and with the beat of their footfalls on the pavement in his ears, Patrick tries to figure out if he’s hitting normal behavior, or some awkward cardboard version of himself. He thinks he’s doing okay. When they turn a corner, wind coming directly off the lake buffets him, and he tucks his head down and then has to work to relax his back muscles against the cold. There’s a part of him that wonders if Jonny is punishing them for screwing around like that, making them run in this wind, but it’s probably just his guilty conscience. Jonny’s not like that. He’s either mad at you, or he isn’t.

They turn back early when Patrick suggests doing interval sprints instead, while he can still feel his fingers. By the time they make it back to the house, it’s turned into a race to the front porch, which Jonny barely wins, but he marches through the door triumphantly anyway. By the time Patrick has to leave for his afternoon classes he feels easier around Jonny, and by the time the house has finished dinner, Patrick's back to lying on Jonny's floor to finish the reading he’d punked out on last night after the barbecue. Patrick works best surrounded by other people who are also working. Jonny generates a room full of dedication all on his own, which Patrick takes advantage of when he needs to plow through really boring material.

Tonight it’s just them and Patrick’s surprised when Jonny tosses his book down with a huff, rubbing at his eyes. 

“You wanna watch a movie?” he asks with a yawn, taking a leisurely stretch. “I need a break.” 

Patrick takes a moment to respond, too busy watching the way his shirt pulls tight over his chest as he rolls his shoulders back. “Yeah, sure,” he says, slowly. “My pick though.” 

Jonny groans. 

“Oh no, I went to that weirdo french movie at the film studies center with you. It’s my turn.” 

Jonny sighs. Patrick cuts through the bathroom to his own room to scan over his collection of DVDs. If they pull up Netflix or Hulu they’ll wind up arguing for a half hour rather than picking a movie. 

He winds up grabbing the first action movie he finds on the shelf, which turns out to be Terminator. Jonny will probably complain, because he’s a coldhearted bastard who hates everything that Patrick loves. 

Jonny surprises him by only commenting, “T2 is better,” when Patrick spins the disk on his finger. 

“T1’s a classic,” Patrick protests as he hands the disk over. “Besides, can’t have your sequel without the original.”

“They’re both classics,” Jonny says, which is kind of like agreeing with Patrick, but in a disagreeing way. 

Patrick settles next to Jonny on the bed, facing the screen. He’s not trying to make it weird again, but as the opening credits roll he’s very aware of where his body ends and Jonny’s begins. His knee jiggles and knocks into Jonny’s thigh. Patrick shifts fractionally farther away. 

He doesn’t remember the last time he saw the movie, but it quickly becomes clear that it’s taken on a gloss in his memory. The shitty one-liners, the bad special effects, and the one-note plot which had terrified and fascinated him as a kid is slow and plodding. Jonny’s delighted mockery is also super annoying. 

On screen the terminator is sitting in profile in a motel room, paging through an address book, his face all shot up, when the motel owner starts to bother him by knocking at the door. 

“Oh no, not this scene,” Jonny says, already laughing. 

‘“Hey buddy, you got a dead cat in there or what?”’ the owner says on the television. 

They watch the terminator pull up various possible responses: yes/no; go away; please come back later; fuck you; fuck you, asshole. Patrick covers his face when the terminator selects ‘Fuck you, asshole,’ and then delivers it in the most ridiculous Austrian monotone. 

The motel owner leaves him alone and it cuts back to Terminator Arnie, who’s been replaced with a puppet version so that the full ‘detail’ of his damaged face can be displayed. 

Jonny cracks up. 

“Oh shut up, it was cool for the time.” Patrick thumps him in the side. 

“If you say so.” He shuts up for a while after that though. 

“Man,” Patrick says idly when Sarah and Reese start making out on the bed after literally building bombs together, “when I was a kid, I thought this scene was so hot.” 

Their hands tangle in the sheets while some corny romantic music plays, but Patrick admits to himself, despite the bad 80s hair and horrible lighting, he still thinks it’s hot. 

“When I was a kid, I used to sneak and jerk off to it,” he says with a rueful laugh. “Didn’t even know what porn was yet.” 

“Oho,” Jonny says, “and now we know why you like this movie so much.” 

“Fuck off,” Patrick says without heat. He looks over at Jonny who’s got his arms up behind his head, watching as Sarah Connor rides Reese for her life, his face expressionless. He bites at his lip and knows he’s pushing it a little when he says, “You had to have something like that.” 

Jonny sucks on his teeth and nods, finally tearing his gaze away from the screen. “The Hunger with Catherine Deneuve.” 

“Isn’t that a Susan Sarandon movie?”

Jonny nods. “Yeah, there’s a bit where she’s got her tits out and they’re rolling around to classical music. White Palace was hot too. My mom loved that movie though, so that uh...made for some fun family moments.” 

“Who knew you had such a thing for Susan Sarandon,” Patrick replies, shifting awkwardly. Jonny’s low voice is making his belly feel all weird. Jonny shrugs and Patrick looks back at the TV where Sarah and Reese are gripping hands as they fuck, and he’s suddenly conscious of the erection he’s sporting. Patrick digs his teeth back into his lip and goes to lift his knee to hide it, but finds himself hesitating, glancing over at Jonny. 

Jonny seems to feel the weight of his gaze, because after a moment he looks over, his eyes inexorably dropping down to Patrick’s middle. 

“Still does it for you, huh?” he says softly, gaze on Patrick’s cock where it just keeps getting harder, obscene and obvious in his shorts. His cheeks are burning, but he’s not embarrassed, not exactly. Jonny makes a small sound in the back of his throat and Patrick blinks. For a moment he’s picturing Jonny and that girl on the TV rather than Sarah and Reese. He can’t seem to let it go. He wonders if Jonny knows. Jonny shifts, his sweatpants pulling tight over his cock, outlining the beginning swell of a semi of his own, and Patrick swallows. 

Without really thinking about it, he finds himself reaching out to cup Jonny’s cock, fingers molding around the hot length of him as he starts to stiffen up further. Jonny breathes out in a whoosh, holding his hips still, and when he catches Patrick’s eyes, they’re wide and dark and surprised. Patrick can’t help himself any longer, leaning in to kiss him. 

Jonny lets him, sinking back into the pillows to take Patrick’s weight as he leans over him. There’s a hailstorm of bullets on the TV behind them that Patrick ignores completely as Jonny’s hands come up to frame his face. Patrick rolls onto Jonny’s body in slow motion as the kiss deepens, helped along by the unsteady pressure of Jonny’s fingers curved around his skull, combing through his hair in time with Patrick’s hand circling on his dick, until Patrick takes his hand away entirely to brace himself on the mattress, so he can rub up against Jonny’s solid thigh. Jonny shifts his knee, aligning their bodies, and when Patrick pushes down again, his mouth drops open at the sweet rub of friction on his cock. 

Jonny pulls him in closer and keeps kissing him, and it’s like two days ago on the desk, how the pace picks up without Patrick’s active direction, no one behind the wheel, just Patrick groaning into Jonny’s mouth and pushing down as Jonny shoves up. Jonny’s arms go around Patrick’s waist, palms stroking across the small of his back to press down firmly, and Patrick turns his head, eyes squeezed tightly closed as he digs his toes into the bedding, trying to get more leverage.

He’s so close, it’s like he’s chasing it down with each roll of his hips. Jonny’s arms around him snaps some sort of brain-to-mouth filter, because he hears himself, voice ragged and edging on a whine as he swears and then says, “I saw you with that girl, I can’t stop thinking about it,Tazer.” 

He feels lost as soon as he says it, body still on the edge and about to topple over, and when Jonny says breathlessly, “Why, you want that?” Patrick’s eyes snap open, surprised, right as he groans and comes between them. Through the frantic drumming of his pulse in his ears, he hears Jonny say, head thrown back, “Because I—I think about it.” 

Patrick kisses Jonny desperately, hand fumbling for Jonny’s dick, and as soon as his hand closes over it, Jonny’s hands clench on his back and he tenses up, cock jerking in Patrick’s grip as he comes. He’s as silent as the time Patrick played inadvertent audience, letting out only the smallest noise against Patrick’s lips when he circles his palm one last time. 

When Patrick sits back, gulping in air like he ran a marathon, Jonny lifts his head, looking down between them. Patrick’s hard on is taking a while to go down, but the nylon shorts are dark and shiny enough you can’t tell he just came precipitously inside them like a fucking kid. Jonny, though, has a damning wet spot spread over the front of his sweat pants just under the waistband. 

“Fuck,” he breathes, thumping his head back on the pillows. He looks annoyed, but when Patrick says his name and presses his thumb to his lower lip his expression smooths out. “Patrick, I—”

“HEY, JONNY!” Hammer calls as he thunders up the stairs, scaring the bejesus out of them both. 

Patrick tumbles off the bed, scrambling to the bathroom between their rooms for his escape and slamming the door behind him. He catches himself in the mirror, his flushed face and messy hair, and blows out a breath. He can’t believe they did that. Well, he can. Maybe that’s the bigger shock. He pulls at the waistband of his shorts, wincing as they stick. A shower seems like a good idea.


End file.
